rolling stone
by fuwafuyu
Summary: "I am back," she said to the clear blueness, though she had no idea of where this was. / a robin-centric multichap detailing her return to the shepherds. might be spoilers, but everything is kind of ? at this point. rated T for safety.
1. in the beginning

There was a calling—quiet and insistent, like the voice of conscience that insists you must to first things first. She did not know who it was, or what, but there was no threat; she followed it subconsciously, as she seemed to have no physical form.

It did not matter to her, though; she was peaceful in this state, if not a bit lonely.

The calling became louder still as she approached its source. She could not see it, as she lacked eyes, but a figure appeared before her anyways. It greeted her, but it did not call her by name.

" _You wake_ ," the caller whispered. She did not hear it, because she lacked ears, but the words were there still. They lingered in her subconscious like so many other things that dart to and fro like tony minnows in a pond, scattering when she goes to gather them up.

 _Yes_ , she replied. There was not a sound, because she lacked a voice. The caller understood her anyways.

There were suddenly questions then—brave little wonders that floated to the surface of the minnow-pond. She asked, noiselessly: _Tell me, where am I now?_

The caller might have laughed then, a gesture that was heard by no one and melted into nothing. " _I cannot say, child, for I myself am unsure. I have dwelt here for millenia, and none whom I choose have asked me of this._ " She felt a warmth then—barely, for she lacked skin to feel with. " _Perhaps I should choose more selectively._ "

 _Am I but a child?_ she asked.

" _You are not young,_ " said the caller. " _In my view, you are—so small, so young and new … but you are not an old soul, my little one. You tempered yourself quite a lot the last time around._ "

She was silent then, for a moment. _I do not know of myself_ , she told the caller. _What is my name?_

" _I cannot tell you that,_ " the caller replied. " _When you go out and grow again, you will know._ "

Then she felt nothing, and there was a pressure, as if she were being confined, and suddenly she felt everything.

" _Go forth, child_ ," the caller told her. " _Return._ "

And then she had eyes; she opened them, there was a blueness so clear and perfect that it seemed like a dream.

Then she had a voice. "I am back," she said to the clear blueness, though she had no idea of where this was. And then she rose and found her feet, and saw that she stood atop a green hill at the foot of a mountain, and that she wore nothing but a shredded tunic.

She heard birdcalls in the trees to her left, and she turned to look; there was one, with a red breast like none of the others, that seemed familiar to her, like the face of a friend you haven't seen since you were very young. She took a gentle breath, awash in the feeling of sweet air in her lungs and warm sun on her face, and her eyes lit upon a village not terribly far away.

There was nowhere else to go, so she went.

* * *

She found the village full of farmers and children, and it was a happy place. Animals ran between the houses, chased by laughing children, and the older children stood in the fields, working or supervising the younger ones. Mothers carried baskets and mended holes in clothing and tended fires within small cottages, and fathers pounded metal into tools and chopped wood.

Somewhere, in her chest, she felt a strange stab of sentiment.

Her bare feet shuffled along the dirt path that cut through the center of the village, and felt her face redden beneath curious stares of the people. But none of them called her out or looked at her with disdain—it was merely curiosity, and nothing more.

And then she was at the center of the village, where a grand tree stood tall and proud, and she sat.

Villagers began to gather around her. They must not get many outsiders, she thought, as she observed the children looking on with excitement and the adults with a hint of wariness. But she was tired now, and the wariness did not unnerve her, because she knew it was instinct to think suspiciously of a stranger dressed as she was.

A young man stepped forth, and he reminded her for a moment of someone—she did not know who, but she felt affection rolling in waves as she took in the familiar build of the boy, and the same kind of cheerful feeling.

"Are you in need of something?" he asked. His voice was polite and reassuring, with the slightest hint of an undertone that told her that he would drive her out within a moment's notice if she meant to do harm.

What was she supposed to say back? She felt no urges, no needs. But she did not know where she was or who she was or why she was here, and she told them so.

"And, you see," she added, softly, "I have nothing but the tunic I wear now."

There was a murmuring that passed through the village people. And then a young woman came forward to stand beside the young man, and she was led into a house by the cornfield with the boy and the young woman.

* * *

The young woman called herself Lana, and she was twenty-eight. The boy called himself Josh. He was seventeen. They told her they were siblings.

Lana asked, "What is your name, then?"

But she could not answer. She had no memory of herself at all.

"Don't worry," said Josh. "Your memories will return soon, I'm sure of it."

"You can stay here until they do," said Lana. "It won't be safe for a lady like you who can't remember a thing to be out in the world by yourself."

Lana gave her another tunic, and some pants and good boots, telling her to keep them as she no longer wore the tunic and the boots had become too small anyways. They fed her bread and juice, and when Josh went to the cornfields to do work, she went with him. He taught her how to do menial work, and she went up and down the rows of corn, tending to the tall crop.

The other children came to see her now, and they asked her many questions. She answered what she could, but the number was disappointingly low.

"Are you staying?" asked one of the little girls. She carried a rabbit delicately, and when answered with a "yes," the girl cheered and pushed the rabbit into her arms and ran into the village to spread the news.

The rabbit snuffled her arms, and she felt very secure in this little farming village.

* * *

Three days passed before she remembered her name. In the morning, she went into the kitchen to greet Lana and Josh, and as she swallowed down her broth, her eyes followed the swoop and call of the red-breasted birds through the window, and it came like lightning—sudden and sharp.

"I remember!" she sputtered, dropping her empty wooden bowl. She knew there had been a reason why the red-breasted birds had been so familiar.

Meanwhile, all consumption of food at the table ceased, and Lana and Josh looked at her with round eyes.

"My name," she continued excitedly. "I'm Robin."

It was silent, and then Josh laughed. He downed his last gulps of broth. "Nice to meet you, Robin," he said, and he shared a handshake. Lana, across the table, glowed at the announcement.

"Robin," she said softly. "It suits you."

And Robin, finally able to answer to her own name, smiled like the sun, and for the rest of the day she introduced herself to anyone she met just to hear her name again and again. It was like finally finding the other glove after agonizing hours of searching, and it fit so perfectly and snugly it was almost as if it was tailored for her and her alone.

The next day, Robin bought a blank notebook in celebration with the little pay she got from doing little chores around the village from the paper-makers by the forest, and she found that she knew how to write. She wrote her name in it, thrice.

Lana suggested she keep a diary. She started her first entry that very night.

* * *

Over the next few days, the memories began to come faster, and at random times. They were just names and perhaps a color or a little buzz, but there was nothing else. Robin wrote the names and colors in her diary, but she couldn't figure out the little buzz that came with some of them, so she left them out.

The name Morgan came one day, in the fields as she was walking towards Josh to ask him a question, and on the same day she got Lucina when her eye happened to catch Lana flick a strand of hair behind her ear. A day later there was Chrom, with a rush of blue and a strong buzz that made it feel like it wasn't just an ordinary name. Robin looked over her list very often. Sometimes she would sit and try to remember something other than just their names—what was their gender? What kind of food did they like? Had Robin been close to them? But she could never get anything more than a name.

She wondered one night, lying in bed after doing her daily odd-job routine, if the names she had gathered were even real people. The thought that they weren't made her very lonely, and she slept restlessly, dreaming of a war and of a great haunting dragon and invisible strings.

The day after her dreams, she found herself continuously reaching to her hip, as if going for a sword, whenever anyone approached her from behind. Her hands were itching, and her fingers tingled; she was very uncomfortable. It helped a little if she held her harvesting tool like a sword when she worked the corn, but her prickling fingers felt restless, and she was jumpy.

Several more days passed. The itching got worse, and the feeling that she should be looking for someone began to form. Her dreams became more and more vivid every night.

On the fifth day, a traveling tome salesman wandered through the village. He offered Robin a try on any of his wares, and though she had chores to do, the itching guided her hands to close around the handle of the jagged sword he held out to her. The itching was gone then, in just a moment. Her fingers continued to tingle, and then she swung the sword viciously. Electricity crackled up and down its pointed edges, and the tingling was cured.

The stack of wood in front of her split into halves from a meter away.

Robin's heart thrummed. Her lungs lost their wind. She gave the sword back to the salesman and meekly returned to Lana's house and did not emerge for dinner that night. Her sleep was fitful, and filled with blood and sweat and loss and tears and death. The memory of electricity coating her hand, of a single strike that pierced straight through the chest, of blue eyes going blank and dead by her hands, haunted her usual dreams of war, and when she woke hours before dawn in the midst of a rainstorm, she did not close her eyes again any longer than to blink.

Robin slept more soundly after that, and it was as if all of her restless dreaming was released in that one horrendous nightmare. She was no longer itching and tingling, but her peace of mind had been greatly disturbed—what if she was someone who could bring harm to this village? The sword had relaxed her somehow, and it made her uneasy.

There were no memories to aid her crisis. The blankness in her mind was cold and unnerving, and there was a chill of terror whenever she thought of the possibility of being someone awful, and there was nothing in her that could tell her yes or no.

Robin began to avoid contact with others. She did not want to hurt any residents of this little farming village that had graciously taken her in, lost and without knowledge. Lana was concerned, and Josh was very confused, and the children followed her around like ducks as they clamored for attention, but Robin couldn't bring herself to tell them anything. It felt, somehow, that it would only make the problem worse. So she did her chores, silently, and she did not participate in the daily chatter of the village people.

And so Robin's world became silent.

* * *

The villagers knew about the Sword Incident within a few days of its occurrence. The village people were tightly knit as a community, and what happens in town goes around fast as a wagon-wheel. Robin was unsure of how to feel about their whispers, and though she didn't understand them, she felt the pitying gazes of the people where there was once wariness, and then affection.

She knew the children were warned to be more cautious by the more paranoid ones, the older generation. But of course, the children continued to gather to her, and it was difficult to avoid. Robin remembered names and names and names whenever she looked at several of them in a certain way, and the notebook was growing thick with inked pages of names and colors and uncertain post-nightmare diary entries.

The names stopped coming, one day; the evening before, she had gotten Gaius from the sweet scent of red yams in the oven, and then the flow of memory was simply … cut off. There were fifty-four names in the notebook, and not quite fifty-four colors and associations, and now Robin's chest felt a strong longing that could only be explained as homesickness.

But where was this home she missed? Secure though she felt in the village, it was not a home, and it came to light that Robin did not know where she was in the world.

Robin decided, eventually, that she should leave the village. She began to gather money in preparation, little by little. The village was poor and pay was not high, and there weren't very many jobs available in the first place. It would take time, but Robin was unsure if she had any to spend on saving up, and the feeling of needing to find someone was solidifying the longer she stayed here to the point where it was nearly a desperation.

She was aware that at some point she would have to tell Lana and Josh of her plans, but that time, she deduced, would not be soon. Robin had very little to her name, and she budgeted and organized her planned spending. She had herself a set amount, as a minimum, and she would not breathe a word to them until she reached that minimum.

But it would take time. Robin figured if she did in fact run out of time, whenever that was, she could still work things out with her tiny, tiny pocket change. Even the weakest swords did not come cheap, however; Robin feared the worst, that when the time came, she would be without enough for a simple short sword for protection once she left.

* * *

It was something Lana had been insinuating on for quite a long time, since Robin had become reclusive: talk. Use your voice, and gather information at the very least. In the end, Robin adored the farming village far too much to continue to cause their pitying looks, and she began to interact again—sparingly so, regrettably. The doubts of her goodwill still remained, and the fear, but she figured that if she was to leave soon, she may as well walk with a better conscience than a guilt-ridden one.

The silence faded, slowly. But no names nor memories resurfaced, and conversation was harder to manage when her every word was choked with the fear of an unknown past. It was easier when she asked things rather than simply stated things in everyday chatter, and there was a growing insatiable need to know more and more as she asked about trivial things.

Robin began to carry her notebook around with her, and when she heard of something that would aid her later on, she noted it.

On the day a traveling merchant spoke of a place called Plegia, the memories began to come in once again. Plegia brought so many negative vibes that she was hesitant to write it in, but she did anyways, as if for later reference. The man had much to tell, and Robin's notebook became fuller and fuller. He was a boisterous man, and throughout his stay in the farming village Robin had not once seen him without his flask in one hand and tome in the other.

Robin asked him, as he prepared to leave the village, where he was headed from here. He laughed a deep belly laugh and replied, "Wherever the roads take me here in Ylisse, m'lady."

She was, in a sense of the word, drastically unprepared for what came with the word Ylisse. There was a surging feeling, a great swelling that filled the homesickness in her chest, and then Robin knew that she had to leave.

"So this is ... Ylisse?" The word tingled upon her tongue, and Robin cursed herself then, because somehow or another despite all her questions and all the time she spent here, she had failed to ask where in the world this tiny village lay on a map. And perhaps if she had, it would have saved her some uncertainty. Stupid, _stupid_!

Somewhere, deep inside, there was a voice that reprimanded her. You're off your game. This isn't like you. But Robin forced herself to ignore it, because she did not know if the voice was genuine. What was she like, then, if such a blunder was "off her game"?

Questions boiled in her suddenly like the kettle that Lana put over the fire. She felt the presence of a hole, beside her, but the person-shaped gap was unrecognizable, so she took her kettle of questions and put it aside for later. There were more important things to think of, now.

There was a map spread across the table, and Lana and Josh stood on either side of Robin. Her hands brushed the section labeled, in bold lettering, YLISSE (HALIDOM OF). The aged parchment felt familiar, somehow, though for the life of her she couldn't remember ever having seen nor held a map like this. Something in the curl of the rolled-up edges and in the dusty scent of travel that came off as a bit musty from disuse tickled at the edges of Robin's mind, and it made her think of candle-light and a gentle voice and … a plate of hot food, for a reason she was very confused about.

Lana placed a finger at the very edge of the bold line that marked the boundaries of the country called Ylisse. "This is where we are," she said. Her finger traced lines drawn from there to a large dot in the center, and tapped it. "This is the halidom's capital, Ylisstol."

Robin studied the locations she pointed out critically, and thought about the possible topography of the tiny lumps and peaks drawn to be hills and mountains and the blank spaces meant to be plains and fields and valleys.

"Father was drafted into the Knights' Order, a very long time ago," Josh added, noticing Robin's questioning eyes that followed the thinner squiggled lines that did not match the ink that the map was printed in. "He added those little trails when he traveled to the capital to answer his summons, and it came back along with his sword when he … when he couldn't make it home."

Lana laughed a little, then. "I think," she murmured quietly, patting the map affectionately, "that he wanted us to travel around, like he got to when he was in the Order. But I suppose that it's too late now—Mother's not here to take care of the fields anymore, so we haven't the time nor money to leave here." She was very quiet for a moment. And then, in a hushed sort of whisper, she spoke like a glass bubble. "Unlike you, Robin."

Robin pursed her lips and continued to stare at the map, but she wasn't really looking at it anymore. She became acutely aware of the hidden pocket of saved-up pay in her room, and of the lightning sword that had relaxed her, and of that insistent feeling that she must be searching for someone, and she said nothing for quite some time.

"But it's not like you're unable to," she said, at last, and when she turned to send a small little smile at the young woman who had offered a bed and food and work, she saw an unreadable face that was distant and yet so intimate at the same time.

Then Josh reached over and tenderly rolled the map again, and when he looked up and smiled a dry little smile Robin knew that they were, simply, unable to.

In the night, Robin dreamt, but the images were blurred and distorted and they faded, slowly, into a murky, silent, clouded sleep.

* * *

Robin woke like the rising sun that morning—slowly, and then all at once. She went down the hall in a thick haze, blinking fuzzy images from half-remembered dreams and shuffling her feet as she thought about breakfast and which morning chores she should do today. It was a daily routine for her, at this point; it had been quite some time past a month that she had been living with the kind siblings who cared for the cornfields.

Lana was there, waiting in the kitchen. This was not an odd occurrence. But she was not busy with the stove, or with other things she had to do, and in her arms there was the map they had shown Robin after she'd asked, and on the table there lay a sword emblazoned with an insignia that was so familiar that Robin had to blink several times to get the image off her mind. From the window she could hear the sounds of menial work, and the sounds of tools in the dirt, and she knew Josh was awake and tending the fields as he was every morning.

A young robin fluttered onto the windowsill, where Lana had put breadcrumbs, and spoke sweetly; it ate up its fill and sang its thanks before it left. Lana watched this happen with gentle eyes, and when Robin's lungs swelled with a yawn she turned, and set the map onto the table.

"Good morning," she said. There was no trace of the glass-bubble tone she had used the day before, and was instead pleasant and resigned. "You're leaving soon, aren't you, Robin?"

Robin was silent, and when Lana's words registered at last, she failed to mask her surprise. She couldn't deny it, because she was, after all, and she could never lie to someone like Lana, anyways. So she nodded, slowly.

Lana hummed, and there was a small little sadness there. "I figured as much," she said. "I knew the moment you began regaining memories that you'd leave someday."

Robin felt a small crack beginning to wedge its way through her chest, but still she kept her silence. And Lana waved her closer, and told her to seat herself, and only when Robin had made herself comfortable on her usual seat at the foot of the table did Lana join her at her usual spot at the head.

There was no sound for a long moment. The noises of work that Josh had been making in the fields had stopped, and then there was the stomp of work boots and then Josh was in the doorway, clutching the rake tight like a weapon. His face was a stone, kind of hurt and looking really put out, and Robin saw a ringing sort of relief hidden inside.

"You said you were gonna wait till after breakfast," he said softly, speaking only to his sister. Lana bit her lip and fiddled with the ends of her hair nervously.

"How did you know I was going to do it now?"

"Gut feeling."

There was another silence, which Lana broke with a sigh.

"Sit with us, Josh," she said. "I know what I said, but … just, please, Josh."

Josh continued to stand. And he looked over at Robin, who was very close to putting two and two together, and then he put his rake aside and sat at his usual spot to the left of Robin. Lana gave him a quiet little smile, just a little hint of wryness, and just like that Josh looked away and crossed his arms over the tabletop. But he no longer had a face of stone, and Robin felt a rush of calm.

Lana laid a hand over the sword that stretched across the small wooden table. She pushed it, slowly, affectionately, gently, until it reached the halfway point, and then stopped.

"It's our father's old sword," she said, and then Robin's mind clicked and put two and two together and came up with five.

But not a word left her lips. She kept her eyes fixed upon the sword and revealed nothing.

Josh was restless, and he tapped his fingers along his bare arms. "Well? You taking it or not?"

Robin reached out and unsheathed the sword as slowly as she could manage. The insignia burned in her eyes, as it had when she'd first seen it from the hallway. It was there, on the hilt of the old blade as well as on its scabbard, and its significance was not lost on her.

"This mark," she murmured, running gentle fingers over its shape. "What is it?"

"It's the Brand of the Exalt," Lana replied, calmly and coolly. "The Order functions under the Exalt's instruction, so all their weaponry carries the Brand."

Robin's mouth felt dry. "Who … who's the current Exalt?"

Josh tipped his head, as if trying to remember. "Uh … currently, it's Lord Chrom, but Father was drafted back before Lady Emmeryn's time, Naga rest her soul ..."

Every kind of internal alarm possible went ringing off like crazy the moment the name Chrom left Josh's mouth, and suddenly Robin was on her feet with the Branded sword clutched tight like a lifeline. She felt her hands shaking, and in her mind she felt a warm presence swaddling her, another hand reaching to sweep her long, pale hair behind her ear, the quiet breath of sleep in her ear in the night, someone lovingly taking her hair and pulling it back into a ponytail as she worked into early morning hours. In her mind there was a voice calling to her, and it made her heart jump like nothing else did, and there was a swelling happiness that spilled over and made Robin drop the blade in shock.

Lana and Josh stood so quickly their chairs clattered to the floor, and looked through cautious eyes trained on her trembling form. Robin felt the concern and confusion radiating from them like the heat of the sun, but she did nothing to console them because she was unsure whether she herself was, in fact, okay.

"Chrom," she said softly, and her heart fluttered.

Robin knew it was time to go. Everything from the electric feeling she got when touching the Branded sword to the way her heart ached when she heard the town's musician play the lyre atop his little soap box told her so; they pointed her away from this little village, this little farmer's hut beside the cornfields, but she knew not where, exactly, they pointed.

"The sword is for you," said Lana. Robin had never heard such a warm sound in the several weeks she had lived in comfort with these siblings, and given their kindred personalities, that was really saying something.

Josh tilted his head downwards, shading his eyes with the fringe he used to curse at when it flopped into his vision. "The map. Take the map. Also." He waved his hand at it without looking up, and lowered his arm to cover his mouth.

Robin suspected he was crying. The name Brady came to mind, but nothing else. But it was not a new name; it had been the forty-third name she had put into her book. She had gotten it when one of the children showed her a little daisy growing by itself at the edge of the road. The flower had seemed somehow relevant, so she had made note of it.

"You remind me of someone," she told Josh fondly. And she said nothing else. She gathered the map and the sword and made to return to her room, but did not move from that spot. She wanted to say thank you, but there was no way to convey the magnitude of those words to these siblings who heard them every day. But she said so anyways, vehemently, and received genuine smiles in return.

It was not enough.


	2. when the sky is clear

Robin's departure was quiet and rather private. Lana and Josh were there, and the children who came to see her most often stood at the front lines. Some clung to Lana's skirt, as if to hide their tears from Robin, but the older ones stood at the front and held back theirs back. Seeing them trying to be strong for Robin's sake gave her a strange sense of motherly pride, but she didn't know how that was possible. She was young, and it didn't seem as if she had any children. Surely she would remember if she did, right?

The names Morgan and Lucina began to feel very significant. She reminded herself to make a note the next time she got the chance.

Lana gave her a large sack of food and a generous helping of gold to go along with her own stash. "We've been saving up whenever we can," she said when Robin tried to protest. "Honestly, I don't know why we did. It's not like we were ever going to use any of it. So now, it's yours." She gave Robin's freshly gloved hands a reassuring squeeze and a motherly kiss upon her forehead. "Good luck, and Naga be with you, Robin."

Josh tried to smile and offered a fist. Robin laughed a little, but tapped knuckles with him anyways. His face resembled those of the children who were trying not to cry, and the thought of it made Robin pull him into a hug that he gladly returned. "Travel safely," he mumbled into her shoulder. "Hope you find wherever it is you're looking for."

Robin sighed softly and patted his hair reassuringly. "Me too, Josh. Me too."

The children were miserable. It was as if they were attempting to guilt her into staying , and if not for all the possibly life-threatening unknown variables it most likely would have worked. But they understood why she was leaving; most of the children knew what the concept of "home" was, and they understood that Robin's home was not here. It certainly did not stop them from making Robin feel any worse.

"Promise to come visit?" one of the smaller girls pleaded. Robin felt a twinge, but she smiled and linked pinkies with her anyways.

"Promise."

She set off around mid-morning. At dawn there had been frost, and it had been altogether too cold to travel efficiently, which was what Robin had been aiming to do. But on the bright side, she supposed, she was able to leave fully rested and with a nice breeze.

And so began Robin's solitary days.

* * *

The path was mostly dirt, and seemed rarely used, judging from the shallow ruts and unusual amount of stones in the path. Robin almost felt like laughing at the little rocks, though she had no honest guess as to why. She supposed it had been some sort if inside joke back when she had all her memories and was living where she was meant to be.

Robin had to pause and re-evaluate herself for a moment. What kind of person did she have to be if she had an inside joke about pebbles, of all things?

She walked for a few days without incident. She ate her food sparingly, having only enough to keep her from losing any valuable body weight, and logged her travels every night in her journal. The pages were nearly all full now; Robin mused over stopping to get a new one before reaching Ylisstol, but eventually decided she'd rather get there first.

On the fifth day, Robin found her first Risen.

It was a gray, slouching, sutured mess of a thing, and with barely just one look she knew what it was, and she hated it. Though, Robin would never be able to tell you how; it was as if the knowledge of it was something she had been born with in her brain. So she drew the Branded sword and approached the thing as it staggered around with its longbow and arrows, and she made quick work of it there on the path.

Robin decided to wrench the bow from its rotten fingers, figuring it might come in handy, and simply cut the quiver straight from its back. She had no idea if she knew how to use them, but she'd rather be prepared; she strung bow and arrows around her pack and, after carefully kicking the remains of the Risen off the path, continued on her way.

Behind her, the Risen's remains melted into purple smoke. Robin kept walking, pulled the hood of her cloak over her face, and pretended she hadn't seen.

There were several more Risen encounters scattered between the next several days, though they were few and far-between. Some of them had no weapons, but Robin showed them no mercy nonetheless. Why she disliked them so much, she simply didn't know, and she supposed perhaps it had something to do with the way they seemed to wish harm on everything that lay before them. Or perhaps it had something to do with the way Robin's heart stilled with fear whenever she saw them raise their weapons. Or perhaps it was the way they seemed to move in swarms of varying sizes and fought unfairly, ganging up and trying to grab the Branded sword she wielded. Or was it the way they seemed to have an intense hatred of humans in general?

Several times, Robin had to rush in to assist a nearby village from a bandit raid, refusing payment when it was offered. And each time, Robin only grew wearier, but it was not new to her; saving the villages, vanquishing Risen – it felt like a past routine now the longer she traveled.

Whether this was good or bad, she did not know.

* * *

Robin had a thought, suddenly, as she watched the rotted innards of a lone Risen splatter to the dirt. Killing the zombie-like things came so easily to her, when she was on autopilot, and the feeling was strange and surreal.

Who was she, really?

It wasn't as if she hadn't thought of the question before. But it came to her abruptly and from the blue as the Risen dissolved into nothing but purple mist and a foul smell. Admittedly the question hadn't come up quite as often now that she was alone seeing as she had other things to be worrying about anyways, and she was unsure as to why it was striking her now, at this precise moment, and with such intensity as well.

Who am I? she thought to herself seriously, staring intensely at the spot where the Risen had fallen. And in that moment, she felt so horribly nostalgic, and she was overcome by the feeling in such a great wave that she was overwhelmed and decided to break for the afternoon meal, though it was only late morning.

Quite a while has passed from Robin left that tiny farming village at the edge of Ylisse, and since that time she has made herself a bit of a small-town celebrity. The villages she passes by buzz with chatter about a young woman bearing a blade with the Brand of the Exalt upon it who goes about clearing the remaining Risen with all the grace and form of a fully trained soldier. And it made her feel younger, for some reason, and wilder and … and …

… and whenever Robin thought about it, it made her want to cry.

But it wasn't it all bad. After all the gossip flowing through the towns of Ylisse, she was beginning to remember something, a little niggling of a word, but she couldn't quite catch it. The word evaded her no matter how she tried remembering.

 _Shhhh_ -something. She knew it started with _sh_.

At night, when she stopped for sleep under the stars, spread before her in the deep dark sky, she thought about the names in her notebook, and she read them over and over, as if doing so would help her remember something – anything – about them. And now only on the odd occasion did she write out a journal entry by the light of the moon. But when Robin actually went to fall asleep, she felt cold, even though the nights were generally sweet and fair; when she woke in the dawn, she was alone, and felt as if sorely lacking something. The lack of information in her was frustratingly vague, and several times she considered the fact that she might be walking to nowhere, that her intuition was completely wrong and she might not find anything once she actually got to Ylisstol.

Robin had to sit down for a moment after reaching this conclusion. It took a few moments to convince herself otherwise, and that none of this had been fruitless. Immediately afterwards, she had drastically quickened her pace, as if to prove something to herself.

But what was there to prove? Robin could not find an answer to even a question like that in her, and she felt so homesick then that she nearly knelt down and wept.

Eventually it came to the point where Robin seldom took the time to look at her map anymore, because after staring at it for so long and with exhaustive attention to detail she has memorized the path, and sees it in her mind's eye every time she looks at the road ahead. She found that the longer she traveled, the less sure of herself she became, and it came to the point where she began to push herself forward late into the night even if she had already grown tired from the brisk pace she had adopted some time ago. And so when she slept, nothing alive was able to stir her, and every morning at the brink of sunrise she woke with a tight throat as she fervently burrowed through her belongings in case she might have been mugged in the night.

She was a paranoid soul; she had accepted that long ago.

Ylisse was a land of many fields, Robin found, as she seldom came across barren lands or thick, vast forests that stretched for leagues (though she did come across smaller patches of forest, the size of which spanned no more than three or four miles in diameter). The going was calm if not hilly, and when the weather had moods every now and then the winds merely accelerated a bit and the rains were gentle and warm.

None of this pleasantry was familiar, though she'd been hoping for the spark. But when the night temperatures dipped into winter chills once in a rare while, and the heat of day spiked considerably in the afternoon when the breeze had blown itself out, she felt the twist of nostalgia in her chest, and she wondered just what kind of land she had lived in before. A desert, she supposed; there was nowhere else that would have such extreme temperatures, but something within her twinged away at the thought. It clicked, awkwardly and dreadfully, and so Robin discarded the hypothesis. Perhaps it had been a past home for her, but she knew now it wasn't what she searched for.

Robin tried not to think about the fact that she did not know how that was so.

* * *

One night, after an unproductive day where she had been restless and unfocused and had wandered off the trail several times, Robin had a lucid dream.

It was a stranger dream than the ones she'd had before, but not in the same unearthly way that made her eyes hurt and her head spin; it was strange in the way that it seemed so frighteningly real, and yet Robin could swear on her life that she'd never seen any of those people before, ever. (Though, to be fair, even if she says they're unfamiliar, her words are not quite what she might call a vote of confidence.)

It hadn't been a lucid one at first. Her consciousness had been floating in nothing, feeling excruciating pain deep in her chest and all over her body, as if she'd been through an awful beating from someone she loved dearly. She felt betrayal, but strangely enough, the feeling wasn't towards anyone except herself.

And then her dream-self had opened her eyes, and suddenly she could do whatever she wanted her dream-self to do.

She lay face up in a tent. Whose tent was it? Robin didn't know, but she felt no paranoia or fear of being in this unfamiliar tent, so she figured it didn't belong to anyone untrustworthy. She sat up from the cot she'd been lying in, and she felt so at ease and so fresh and reassured that she knew immediately that it was a dream.

"Robin!" called a voice. It was painfully familiar, and it made her heart jump and light up like a match. "Hey, you awake? We're packing up soon!"

"Y-yeah, coming!" she called back. And she threw herself from the cot and straight out the tent's two front flaps in a sudden and unexpected desire to see the owner of that voice. In her haste, she crashed right into someone standing directly in front of the tent, and when she nearly fell, that person caught her delicately with strong hands. "Oh – "

There was a laugh, and Robin realized she was staring into someone's well-toned chest. Her heart was going a mile a minute, and at the rate it was pounding now it might as well just burst from her chest. "Having an energetic start, I see. Did you sleep well?"

Robin looked up, and she was completely unprepared for the look she was met with. Not only was this man incredibly handsome, he was smiling down at her with such a tender look that she could hardly catch her breath. His eyes were blue, but they were such a dark navy color that she could only just barely tell if they were actually black or not. He had a very particular shade of blue to his hair, and it was in that perfect in-between area of tousled and neat. He didn't have the sharpest face she'd ever seen, but it she liked it that way; it added some sort of average sense to this man with godly visual appeal. Robin hated to admit it, but everything from the shape of his nose to the way his bangs tickled his temples was completely, unarguably perfect. And gods, the look he was giving her–

It took a moment for Robin to remember that she was supposed to answer him. "Oh! Oh. Uh, um, yeah, I … I guess." She paused awkwardly. "S-sorry."

He laughed. "Hey, it's nothing. You better hurry to the mess hall, Robin, or else Stahl's gonna clear you out." He gave her a friendly pat on the shoulder as he began to walk away, and suddenly Robin became acutely aware of how warm this man's hand was against her skin. "I'll see you later for that strategy meeting, yeah?"

"Aren't you eating?" She didn't know what compelled her to ask, but she supposed it didn't really matter anyways; her eyes were locked tight onto his, and though she desperately wanted to look away and observe everything and anything she could, it was completely impossible.

"Oh, I'm full," he said simply. "It was my turn for kitchen duty, so I had a bit then; I'll be alright, if you were wondering. I'm off to the weapons tent before Frederick can catch me," he added, gesturing to a rectangular tent to her left. "but I'll see you after breakfast! I'll be there all morning, probably, so find me when you're done." And this incredibly handsome hunk of a man swooped to her cheek and gave her a gentle peck that lingered in place as if he had burned her.

Robin kind of felt like she was going to pass out. He seemed to notice, and with a gentle tenderness that made her hammering heart ache in her chest, he cupped her face in his hands and turned her to get a better look.

"Sorry," he said lightheartedly. "Was that a bit too sudden? You're all red ..."

It took her a moment, but somehow or another she took the thickest breath she had ever taken in her life and nodded slowly. Her throat was clear, but it felt like if she tried to speak a word, she might accidentally say something that would completely ruin the whole thing.

Namely, she had absolutely no idea who this man was.

It was almost a miracle that Robin was able to stumble her way out of that scenario with the Gorgeous Man, but as soon as he left it suddenly occurred to her that she had no idea where the mess hall was. Now that she wasn't tragically occupied by the Gorgeous Man's presence, however, she could finally get a better look around the place, and Robin realized with a start that she was currently standing in the middle of what seemed to be a bustling army camp, and most of its occupants seemed to be going in the same direction.

The most likely explanation was that they were heading to the mess hall for breakfast, like she was supposed to, and Robin decided the best plan of action for the time being was to follow them. She had not, however, taken into account that the other people in the camp might know who she is, just like the Gorgeous Man had, and the moment she slipped into the flow as inconspicuously as possible, she was approached out of the blue by a man in a cloak who smelled copiously of sugar.

"Heya, Bubbles," the man said. Robin couldn't help but notice the array of candies lining his belt; so that was where all this sugar was coming from ... "So how was your night?"

"Uh," was her intelligent reply. "It was ... okay, I guess?"

"Anything happen?"

"N-nothing in particular ..."

"Really." Robin watched with a sort of distant fascination as he pulled a lollipop from what seemed to be thin air and shoved it in his mouth. He rolled the candy in his cheek for a moment, and then gave her a sidelong glance. "Well, you'd better do something about that red face of yours, or people're gonna make some assumptions on their own."

Robin just about slapped herself. Was her face really still that red?

"Oh, let me guess." The man twirled his lolly. "Old Blue dropped another one on ya, didn't he?"

Who in the name of Naga even was "old Blue?" But her body seemed to react on her own, and in the space of a moment, her whole body was swamped with hot, sickly embarrassment."I - he - um...!"

"Looks like I got it." The man laughed, shaking ginger hair out of his eyes. "Do you even know how red your face is capable of becoming? Ye gods, Bubbles."

"W-well -" Robin began, and then stopped because she didn't have anything to reply with. She sighed and accepted defeat.

"A-anyways, aren't you just spoiling your appetite with that candy?"

The man snorted. "As if." And he offered no other explanation for his answer.

Robin decided that was okay.

* * *

The mess hall turned out to be a large, hall-like tent (hence the name) that housed several tables, and at the far end of the tent there was a great big pot and a line of assorted soldiers leading up to it. Most of them were already seated at the long tables, scarfing down what looked to be meat stew, and just by looking Robin could tell that this particular militia contained several interesting characters. Those who deserved mention included a tall, stoic-faced brunet man who seemed to be eating nothing but bread despite the bowl of stew staring him in the face, a shorter more lax-looking young man who appeared to be plowing through his third serving with an extra one set out in front of him, and a sweet-looking redhead who was feeding a large black dragon by the entrance with the same spoon she herself was eating from.

Robin wondered if this was normal.

The ginger with the lollipop stepped into line, and seeing as Robin herself felt actually quite hungry, she followed with a touch more vigor than necessary.

The line shifted fairly quickly, Robin noticed absently. Its pace was quick but rhythmic, and as she grew accustomed to the way the line was moving, her eyes began to wander. She studied the way certain soldiers were closer than others, and the way they all seemed to be edging away from one person, who sat in the corner and appeared to be staring intently at Robin; though this greatly disturbed her, she tried not to let it show, and instead directed her line of sight elsewhere.

Every now and then, a soldier would call out to her, maybe wave hello and tell her good morning. Was this a place she frequented often? Had she traveled across the continent arm in arm with these people? It was a nice thought. Robin decided she rather liked these people, despite having no memory of them prior to the current.

Even if this is a dream, she thought to herself, it sure is nice to be here.

"Good morning, Robin," said the young brunette woman serving the stew, and Robin was hit very suddenly with the realization that she was at the front of the line. "You all right?"

"Ah - yes, thank you." She accepted the bowl gingerly from the young woman, feeling for some reason like the bowl might slip from her fingers if she wasn't monitoring the entire exchange. "How about you?"

"Oh, I'm fine!" she replied cheerfully. "Better than fine, actually; today me and Cynthia are going to spar on our pegasi. I'm so excited, can you tell?" She handed Robin a spoon. "Have a nice breakfast, Robin! We're sitting right over there. I'll join you in a minute, okay?"

"You're sitting with me?"

"Of course? Robin, are you sure you're all right? You're acting a little funny ... I mean, we sit together almost every day ... "

"Oh. Oh! Right, I'm sorry, I kind of lost my head for a second." Robin pitched a laugh and hoped to high heaven that it didn't sound too fake. "I'll see you there, yes. Thank you."

And she walked off in a random direction, trying to look like she knew exactly where she was going. Luckily, the gods seemed to smile down her at that exact moment, because just as she was starting to seriously consider just plunking down wherever with crossed fingers that it was anywhere remotely nearby the location of "right over there", a redhead by the entrance (not the one feeding the dragon, mind you) waved her over with a call.

"Good morning," the redhead said as Robin slid hesitantly into her seat. "You're all right now?"

"Uh, yes," she replied, doing her best not to stare. Perhaps it was just her, but this woman seemed to be exuding something that just screamed perfect. But not in a bad way, Robin thought as she watched the woman nibble at the stew (she wrinkled her nose a bit as she chewed; "Bear meat again, I see," she'd commented somewhat dejectedly). She seemed perfect in the way that leaves a person inspired and awestruck, rather than the way that makes you want to knock them down a level from their infuriating grace and flawlessness.

It was a good feeling, Robin decided as she tucked in to her own breakfast.

Unfortunately, she never got to taste it, because as soon as the spoon touched her lips, she blinked, and when her eyes opened again she was met by the carpet of stars that she had become so used to sleeping under. And she lay there for a few minutes, watching the diamond chips in the fading velvet skies slowly disappear for the dawn, and found herself grasping at straws when she tried to recall what she had just dreamed about.

"I have the worst memory ever," she said to the few streaks of cloud in the sky, and with her breath misting the air, Robin got up and packed her things for the day. For the first time in nearly a week, she did not rifle through her things in a paranoid haze, and her hands were not rushed with a certain sense of fear; her feet walked surely on the path, and she moved at a reasonable pace rather than the exhaustive trot she had set before.

Within the time it took her to finish breakfast, Robin had nearly forgotten her lucid dream, and though she did her best to recreate it in her mind's eye, everything she had dreamed of seemed to be behind some kind of veil. But as she set out for the day, she was left in a comfortable state. No longer did she question her instinct and decisions; if indeed there turned out to be nothing in Ylisstol, there was nothing stopping her from simply turning around and going straight back to that little farming village by the wood.

* * *

It had been almost a fortnight since Robin had left Lana and Josh. The thought struck her abruptly and came unbidden as she sat with her dinner at a local inn she had decided to stay in for the night, and she lost herself momentarily in some kind of nostalgic cloud as she worked through the bland, watery porridge that the innkeeper had decided was suitable to be a meal. When she snapped herself out of it, her porridge was nearly finished, and she couldn't recall whether she had actually eaten it or not.

Well, not like it mattered. Robin had been planning to give up on the porridge in a moment anyways.

She stood up and dropped her pay for dinner on the table without counting it. The windows were dark now; she had been up and walking since dawn, and the word "bed" sounded extremely appetizing to someone who had spent the better part of two weeks without setting foot in any place featuring anything more than chairs. Though, it wasn't like she hadn't had human contact; every few days she had to stop in at a nearby town to buy herself some more food, but she never stayed for very long and never stopped to talk to anyone longer than she needed to. It had seemed irrelevant at the time; perhaps it still was, but whenever Robin thought of talking to someone in just a regular conversation, like simple back-and-forth with nothing being passed between them otherwise, she froze up and couldn't help but cut the conversation short. It was the anxiety again—that awful, choking fear that she was something she didn't want to be, something that put others into immediate danger.

But Robin was lonely. She was so horribly incurably lonely, and it hurt more than anything she had words for, and the bits of idle conversation she was inevitably forced to partake in only made it so much worse. And Robin knew so surely—more surely than she knew her own name—that she had been like this once, and someone she couldn't remember had promised her she would never have this again.

But who was it?

The process of fetching her room key from the muscled, intimidating man at the key desk was absolutely terrible (crippling, horrible, dreadful fear). The floor creaked under her boots the entire way up the stairs and down the rickety halls to the last room on the left, and the scrape of the key in the door's lock sent shivers up and down her spine.

The last room on the left was no bigger than any of the other rooms. It was bare and cubic and apparently leaked in the far right corner judging from the stains on the ceiling, but Robin could literally not care any less. The room had four walls and a roof and a bed and that was all she needed right now.

Her sleep was restless and deep. If Robin dreamed then, she did not remember it.


End file.
